One of the most grueling jobs involves the lifting, transporting, and moving of heavy objects. These occupations or the individual tasks can be quite laborious and stressful. These tasks are so taxing on the human body, that each year thousands of people are injured or debilitated in these endeavors.
In order to alleviate some of the stress and burden, a hand truck is used to facilitate the movement of heavy objects. These hand trucks are standard-issued equipment in almost all industries, warehouses, etc.
After placing a load on the hand truck, the two most difficult aspects of lifting are the amount of pull force necessary to lift the object and the wheel-roll of the dolly or hand truck. The amount of pull-force necessary to lift an object with a hand-truck or dolly is the ratio of the length of the handles and the distance between the axle and the center of gravity of the object being lifted. For example, with a 4 foot handle and 1 foot between the axle and the center of gravity, the resulting ratio is 4:1. Therefore, for a load of 500 lbs, an operator must expend 125 lbs of pull force.
Furthermore, an equal amount of counterforce must be exerted against the axle to prevent the hand-truck from rolling backwards towards the operator. The same problem with wheel roll is also encountered while setting the load back on the ground. To counter the wheel-roll, one must place their foot on the axle. The heavier the load, the harder one must pull and the more force one must place with their foot on the axle. And with a heavy load, this could translate into a hundred pounds of force or more.
Therefore what is clearly needed is an apparatus which enables a handtruck or dolly to be used with minimal effort. This apparatus should increase the amount of leverage by moving the fulcrum point closer to the object being lifted. The apparatus should also eliminate the problem of wheel-roll one faces while lifting or setting the load.